High-rise Residents Say Plans Are Lacking

September 18, 2003|By MICHAEL FABEY Daily Press

HAMPTON — Elderly and handicapped residents of the Lincoln Park high rise said Wednesday they are worried because there is no evacuation plan to safely get them out of the one of the highest residential buildings on the Peninsula.

About two-thirds of the 112 residents in the eight-story structure are elderly and many of those have one handicap or another.

In public meetings in the complex as far back as the spring, residents voiced their concerns about a lack of a known plan for an evacuation in case of an emergency.

Such as a hurricane.

As Isabel beat a path toward Hampton Roads, 50-year-old Cynthia Aleshire watched the clouds gather outside her top-floor apartment with growing concern. She has arthritis in her hips and often needs a cane to get about.

"How are they going to get us out of here?" Aleshire asked.

The Hampton Roads Redevelopment and Housing Authority owns the building and Executive Director Frank Lofurno says the agency has an evacuation plan. But Aleshire and other residents say they've never seen it -- or been part of any evacuation drill.

"Maybe the people who were here when we put it together aren't here anymore," Lofurno said Wednesday.

He said he did not have the details of the plan in hand, nor did he know when it was put together. He was not in his office at the time.

The Lincoln Park management office said it did not know of an evacuation plan. "We just wait for information from the city," a worker there said.

Lofurno said residents in the towers received an information sheet earlier this week telling them how to prepare for a hurricane, where the nearest shelters are, and other details put out by the city.

Aleshire said, "We haven't received anything about how they're going to get us out here. It's going to be something here."

Michael Fabey can be reached at 247-4965 or by e-mail at mfabey@dailypress.com